The Tea Board may consider requests made by six Bengal gardens to start plucking leaf and manufacturing tea ahead of the February 11 deadline.

The board has decided to set up an expert committee that will visit each of these north Bengal gardens to assess if there is any merit in the demand for early resumption of tea production.

Mandatory closure of harvesting and manufacturing tea has been imposed by the board from December 15, 2018 in the states of Bengal, Bihar, Sikkim, Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh.

The closure will be in place till February 11 for Bengal and Bihar and February 28 for other states.

Six out of the 446 gardens in Bengal made separate representations for early opening. They are Namring in Darjeeling, Nuxalbari, Oodlabari, Aryaman, Mainak and Kumarika tea estates.

“The committee will assess if these gardens can produce quality tea in sufficient quantity,” an official of the board said.

Sources indicated that initial reports suggested that these gardens were not ready for plucking and producing tea.

“The Tea Board is of the opinion that as the date for resumption was declared based on technical consultations with representatives of industry associations and tea research institutes, the same shall not be altered.

However, the board is considering the representations received on a case-to-case basis by referring the matter to a committee of experts who would verify such claims based on field inspections.

“Only if the expert committee recommends and confirms that a certain amount of good quality tea leaves have been found, then only the board may consider any change in dates for the representing gardens,” a notice from the board said.

Tough times

Some of the gardens say they produce good quality tea in moderate quantities in late January, ahead of the first flush, which fetch good price in the market.

“At a time when the gardens are struggling to operate profitably, even a small quantity, if it fetches good price because of its quality, counts. Let us hope that the Tea Board approves our request for early resumption of harvesting,” a garden owner who has made such a request said.

Gardens usually use the winter for pruning and cleaning up the bushes.

Advent of warm weather marks the beginning of budding of new leaves, which are plucked for production of first flush tea.